Israel's 51 Day Genocide Campaign

The following article sums up pretty much what was happening in Gaza this time last year. It's a telling piece of writing, and one you know Shawn Hannity wouldn't touch with a ten foot poll. Certain facts and phrases perhaps I should have highlighted for emphasis. In the terms of a Jury trial "No other reasonable conclusion is left to the reader". And by the way if you think Donald Trumps remarks against Mexicans are barbed with racial contempt, you should listen to Shawn Hannity talk about the Mexicans who are in this country illegally. Shawn makes Trump's remarks seem tame. I only mention this because racial prejudice and bigotry can be drummed up by almost any leader and Israel's prime minister is a master at it, a master at propaganda and lies. Here's the article.

Max Blumenthal’s latest book, The 51 Day War: Ruin and Resistance in Gaza, tells a powerful story powerfully well. I can think of a few other terms that accurately characterize the 2014 Israeli assault on Gaza in addition to “war,” among them: occupation, murder-spree, and genocide. Each serves a different valuable purpose. Each is correct. The images people bring to mind with the term “war,” universally outdated, are grotesquely outdated in a case like this one. There is no pair of armies on a battlefield. There is no battlefield. There is no aim to conquer, dispossess, or rob. The people of Gaza are already pre-defeated, conquered, imprisoned, and under siege — permanently overseen by military drones and remote-control machine-guns atop prison-camp walls. In dropping bombs on houses, the Israeli government is not trying to defeat another army on a battlefield, is not trying to gain possession of territory, is not trying to steal resources from a foreign power, and is not trying to hold off a foreign army’s attempt to conquer Israel. Yes, of course, Israel ultimately wants Gaza’s land incorporated into Israel, but not with non-Jewish people living on it. (Eighty percent of Gaza’s residents are refugees from Israel, families ethnically cleansed in 1947-1948.) Yes, of course, Israel wants the fossil fuels off the Gazan coast. But it already has them. No, the immediate goal of the Israeli war on Gaza last year, like the one two years before, and like the one four years before that, would perfectly fit a name like “The 51 Day Genocide.” The purpose was to kill. The end was nothing other than the means. In 2014, as in 2012 and 2008, Israel again attacked the people of Gaza, using weapons provided for free by the U.S. government, which could be counted on, even standing completely alone, to defend Israel’s crimes at the United Nations. Practicing what’s been called the Dahiya Doctrine, Israel’s policy was one of collective punishment. The stories in the U.S. media focused on Israelis’ fears. The deaths of Gazans were explained as intentional sacrifices by a people with a “culture of martyrdom” who sometimes choose to die because it makes good video footage. After all, Israel was phoning people’s houses and giving them 5-minute warnings before blowing them up. The fact that it was also blowing up shelters and hospitals they might flee to was glossed over or explained as somehow involving military targets. But the Israeli media and internet were full of open advocacy by top Israeli officials of genocide. On August 1, 2014, the Deputy Speaker of Israel’s Parliament posted on his Facebook page a plan for the complete elimination of the Gazan people using concentration camps, to take one of dozens of examples. And the whole thing was kicked off when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu lied that three murder victims might be still alive, falsely blamed their kidnapping on Hamas, and began raiding houses and mass-arresting Gazans. Once Israel and the United States had rejected out-of-hand quite reasonable ceasefire demands from Hamas, the war/genocide was on for 51 days — with great popular support in Israel. Some 2,200 Gazan people were killed, over 10,000 injured, and 100,000 made homeless by a very one-sided war.

In the news John Kerry hobbled out on his crutches to report on the Iran situation saying it was still a toss up whether or not we’d have a nuclear deal with Iran.  But it’s sure be nice if we could get a sound deal.  If the stock market isn’t troubled by that there is always the Greek situation.  The Greek people voted to give the middle finger to the European Union and the Euro and not even try for another bail out.  Personally I think the sooner they make a clean break from the EU the better off they will be, because the more they submit to the machinations of those German bankers, they only seem to dig themselves in deeper and deeper.  A one man plane pulling a banner had to crash land on the sands of a beach in Carlsbad because he ran out of fuel.  A twelve year old boy got clipped by a wing with a big gash in the head.  Others had near misses.  A balcony collapsed somewhere on the east coast as a family was getting ready to pose for a family photograph.  There are a number of serious injuries there.  The collapse was caused by nails completely rusting out.   In other news the American women’s soccer team defeated Japan 5 to 2 in Vancouver.   Princess Charlotte was Christened today in the same gown used by her other brother, who is two and has new clothes today.  And Hillary after 23 years still doesn’t know how to deal with the press.  She roped off the press so they couldn’t get too close to her to ask questions.  Hillary is the most people phobiac of any candidate I’ve seen.  She seems content to run an almost secret campaign where nobody knows anything.

 Breakfast with the Beatles started off with mellow songs.  They played the most sophisticated version of “In Spite of all the Heartache” and they played Paul doing “Twenty Flight Rock”.   They played stuff from “Rock and Roll” and I don’t know who sang “I’m All Shook Up”.  It sounded like a non Beatle.  From Ringo I heard “Honey Don’t” and “Go to Memphis in your Mind” (from “Ringo-rama”) and “Goodnight Vienna” the answer to the space craft question.  They concluded with that “End of the night” song co written with George Harrison and Mal Evans, and ended five minutes early.  I had two cups of punch at the break.   Ringo will be at the Capitol records building on his birthday on Tuesday.